Merry Christmas!

I was a bit delayed in posting pre-Christmas pictures because I had so many videos to download!  It had been a pretty exciting time in our household leading up to Christmas.  It all started with Bryant's Christmas Program for school.  They sang two songs, so it was over pretty quick, but it was still cute.  Bryant and his buddies are middle of their class age-wise, which is a bit surprising in the videos because the older kids (off to the left) are a lot crazier and also shorter.

That weekend, Bryant came down with a bit of a cold, but you wouldn't guess that with this big smile.

What would cause such a big smile?  We decided we wanted to teach Bryant to ski this winter and we found a pair of used skis for him.

We decided to take them out in the yard and give them a try.  He had so much fun and actually did pretty well.

So the next day, we decided to take him to Great Divide, a ski hill about 1/2 hour away from us.  They have a tow rope area to help kids learn to ski that is free.  And an instructor approached us right away to see if he could help Bryant learn.  Bryant was a bit shy, but after about a minute, he took off all by himself with the instructor.  He learned to wiggle, wiggle to get started, french fries with his skis to go fast, and pizza with his skis to slow down.  The instructor was pretty impressed with his balance and said we're going to have our hands full!

We got to spend Christmas Eve with my brother and parents.

Can you believe I actually got a picture of everyone smiling???

We opened some cousin presents

and the kids decorated our reindeer dessert.

This was our Pinterest "nailed it" moment.  Do they look like the picture???

The kids got all snuggled up in their blankets from Grandma and Grandpa and had to listen to Grandma and I play the piano.  We were extremely rusty, but still good enough that all the kids recognized and sang along to Jingle Bells.

Bryant wanted to play the piano with mommy too:)

Someone was super excited for super hero pajamas...

It was so cute to watch - as soon as Bryant put on his pajamas, he transformed into a super hero and was doing fancy ninja moves all over the house.

Then it was time to head home and get ready for Santa to visit.  Bryant set out a cookie and milk for Santa and carrots and water for his reindeer.

Christmas morning, Bryant came into our room and snuggled up in our bed without even bothering to look if Santa came.  When we asked him about it, he was excited to go look.  He asked for a choo-choo train from Santa, so I thought that would be the first thing that he would look for, but he spent a good couple of minutes inspecting whether Santa and his reindeer ate their snacks.  He finally looked under the tree and was super excited for all his train stuff.  The themes this year were definitely trains, super heroes, and Paw Patrol!

This was when dad was bringing him his stocking...I just love the excitement in his face!

After stockings, we had both Grandmas and Grandpas over to enjoy the festivities.  I probably say this all the time, but we feel so lucky to have both sets of grandparents so close that we can spend so much time together.  And there's just something special about experiencing Christmas through a little one's eyes again.

The other thing that really brought a smile to my face was how excited he was for other people's presents too.  He was such a big helper this whole Christmas and helped us wrap almost every present.

He definitely found his new favorite sweatshirt.  He was wearing it today too and telling us a story that his friend at school has a sweatshirt like that too, but Bryant's was cooler.  And that people can't see him with his mask on, but he can see them.  And the holes in the mesh are too small for people to poke their fingers through.

With all the excitement there was no way I was going to try and put Bryant down for a nap.  Usually he gets cranky by late afternoon, but he did so well the whole day.  But by the end of the night, he started to get pretty silly...here he is dancing to the music on his new toy phone.

It is hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone.  The lesson at the children's service at church on Christmas Eve was to remind everyone to make sure the enjoyed all the love that was shared on Christmas and not just the presents.  It was such a great time with family and we were all spoiled rotten with love (and presents).  Thanks to all who helped make our Christmas so special!